Resident Mammal
by RedBirb12
Summary: Nick Wilde lost his crime-fighting partner, Judy Hopps, 3 years ago when she mysteriously went missing. However, the spark to try to find her again was lit when Nick received an email from her, inviting him to visit her at the countryside
1. Chapter 1 - Email

**Chapter 1 - Email**

Nick Wilde was driving down the countryside, on an hour-long trip from the city of Zootopia. It's been 3 years since he's seen his ex-crime fighting partner, Judy Hopps, ever since she'd gone missing. However, recently, Nick had received an email from Judy's email address.

"Hello, Nick!

It's been so long since we've last seen each other! I feel like you should come for a visit! I currently reside at 17 Raken Road. I'll be available at 5 PM, please meet me here!

Love, Judy"

Nick hadn't respond to the email, but he knew that this had to be investigated. After all, people who go missing for 3 years and are presumed to be dead usually don't send emails.

Nick saw a mailbox with "17" on the side of long Raken Road. He turned the wheel of the car to the left and drove down the long, windy road to the property. Nick drove to the point where the road stopped, but he could still see a house in the short distance. He got out of car, locked it up, put the keys in her left pocket, and began the trek to the house. The path was very muddy, woody, and buggy, but Nick finally arrived in the front yard to a house that looked years abandoned…

Nick took out his phone to check the email again, and, yes, this is certainly the right house. Stepping up onto the rotting, decaying front porch, Nick looks through the window to see a living room that looked like it was straight out of the 50's. A small, but super fat tube TV, a grandfather clock, a couple of couches with flower designs on it, a broken wooden rocking chair, the perfect grandma's house. Well, except for the naked, dead looking bunny on the floor.

"JUDY?" Nick panicked.

At first he tried to open the window, to no avail. He couldn't even smash it in, it was some pretty strong glass. The door, however, was is much worse shape than the window, and gave Nick next to no trouble when he tried kicking it down. Once he got into the living room, he kneeled down next to the bunny, grabbing her shoulder.

"J-Judy..." Nick whispered

Yep, that was Judy, alright, something felt very off. The "off" feeling was made very apparent when Judy launched up and grabbed Nick by his neck, holding him very tight. After a couple seconds of shock, Nick realized he couldn't breath, and tried pulling away. When that didn't work, he extracted his claws and began to desperately claw at the bunny's arms. Nick quickly grew weak from asphyxiation, and soon didn't have it in him to keep resisting. He soon fell unconscious.


	2. Chapter 2 - The Escape

**Chapter 2 - The Escape**

"No, carrot-ass, he's not becoming part of the family!"

"Daddy, please!"

"No! I know how you feel about him, and you're gonna try to run off with him to start your own family, ain't ya?"

"No, that's not what I want to - oh, forget it! Just throw him in the basement for now, we'll figure out what we'll do with him later."

"Oh, all right, only for you, sweetheart."

Nick could hear 2 voices arguing. One was definitely Judy, the other couldn't be recognized. Nick didn't open his eyes, nor did he move. He just laid there, listening in on what was being argued.

Suddenly, footsteps came towards him and a hand grabbed the back of his shirt. This sent Nick into full panic mode, forget pretending to be asleep, he had to get out of there. Nick began thrashing around, grabbing the hand that was pulling him and trying to scratch at it.

"Oh, ho ho! The feisty fox is awake!" Boomed the unknown voice.

Nick quickly put his arms in his sleeves and slid out of his shirt, hitting the floor with a light thud, getting up, and sprinting across the room.

"Haha, where do you think you're heading off to?" The voice laughed

Nick turned around to find that the voice belonged to a male arctic fox. He didn't chase him, he just stood there, laughing.

Nick turned back around and dashed through the open door and down the hall. He had no idea of the house layout, and no idea of where he was heading.

"Ahem... Sweety, can you please go retrieve our naughty house guest?"

"Yes, daddy." Judy obeyed, falling onto her 4 paws and running out of the room, chasing after Nick.

Nick ran to the end of the hall where there was a boarded up window, still allowing some of the remaining sunlight to flood the hall. He tore at one of the boards on the window, putting all of his strength into it, but it was hopeless. The boards weren't coming down.

Nick heard scattering across the floor behind him and what sounded like a feral cat hissing. He turned around to see Judy, who was once his best friend and crime-fighting partner, on her 4 paws bounding down the hall towards him. In a moment of panic, He reached behind him and felt a baseball bat that was leaning against a side-table. He waited until Judy was no farther than a foot away from him before swinging the bat and sending her sprawled on her back in front of him.

All he could do was stand and stare in shock. It took until she got back up and jumped at him for him to realize that he had to move. He ducked down and Judy went right into the boarded up window behind him, cracking the window and possibly some of the boards.

He got back up and grabbed the doorknob of the door to his right, opening it and closing it right behind him. He sat up against the door, thinking Judy would try to barge through it, but she never did.

After a few minutes of holding up the door against a threat that didn't exist, Nick let his guard down and slouched against the door. That's when the tears rolled in, and his face went to his paws. How could he have brought himself to hurt his friend like that? He had to do it, it was in self defense, but he really wishes it didn't come down to that. However, Nick had to keep moving and he knew it, so after quickly organizing his thoughts and suppressing his emotions, he got on his knees to help himself get up. As he looked up ahead of him, he met glares with a white fox. It wasn't the same white fox as before, or, as Judy calls him, "Daddy", but it was a vixen!

"It's bed time, honey" was all that the vixen said before her fist met with Nick's face and everything went dark.


	3. Chapter 3 - The Basement

**Chapter 3 - The Basement**

Nick woke up in a cold, dark cell. It was damp, the air was moist, and it smelled awful. The smell was like fungus and flesh, and it was absolutely nauseating. The only light was coming from a candle resting on a small barrel in the corner of the cell. The walls were stone, with the door to the cell being made of wood.

Nick sat down against one of the walls, trying to recollect his thoughts and memories. He remembers a white fox, a crazy Judy, and a fist meeting his face. As soon as he remembered the first, he reached for his left eye, and, yep, immense pain ensued.

"Shit..." Nick cursed out loud. He could also feel his eye swelling at bit at this point.

Nick launched upwards and started quickly pacing in circles around his cell, trying to think of what he could do. He had hundreds of thoughts racing around his head, all conflicting with each other.

He looked to the door, maybe he could burn it down. He held the candle to the door, but that didn't do anything.

He put the candle back down onto the barrel and flung himself against the door. Nope, that's a pretty sturdy door. He put the candle on the floor, picked up that barrel, and rammed it against the door at full force. Still no signs of the door giving. Nick ruled out the option of breaking the door down as well.

Nick sat back down against the back wall, beginning to panic and lose hope of getting out, when he heard footsteps echoing from outside the room. He jumped up, grabbed the barrel, and waited…

The footsteps stopped in front of the door, and then silence. The silence probably only lasted for a few seconds, but it felt like minutes of heart-beating, anxious silence.

"Are you checking in on our new son, Howard?" Cried the nagging female voice that had punched him earlier.

"... Yes, sweetheart! But, we don't yet know if he'll be our son, yet!" Howard responded, the voice that had belonged to fox from when he tried to run from him and Judy.

"Goddamnit, you stupid sonova bitch! I want more kids!" Nagged the, Nick assumed, wife.

"Will you shut the hell up, Marie?" Howard screamed away from the door.

A loud, painful sounding whine came from Marie before fading out, and the silence taking its place once again. The sound of keys in the door's keyhole had then startled Nick almost enough to make him drop the barrel. He reaffirmed his grip on his only weapon, and as the door swung open, Nick ran at Howard, bulldozing him with the barrel.

Nick tripped and fell behind Howard. He felt a pull at his foot, and his other foot made the reaction of kicking Howard in the face, loosening the grip on his foot and giving Nick the opportunity to pull away and make a mad dash for it.

Nick had found himself in a familiar situation: Running from a threat in a house that he didn't know the layout of, and having no idea where he was going or how he was actually going to escape. However, this time, he could barely even see where he was going either because of how poorly the basement was lit up.

Nick kept running around the basement halls until coming to a stop and falling to his knees. He had no idea how long he had been running, but he couldn't keep going.

He sat up against a wall and waited to catch his breath. He was heaving and panting, and felt like he was going to vomit from the smell of the basement. It was a nonstop smell, constant in every room and hall he'd been in. He looked up and saw a slanted picture frame hanging from the wall. He could've sworn that he'd seen that same slanted frame a few times already. He probably was just running circles…

Nick got up and walked over to the other wall of the hall to take a closer look at the picture. It was a picture of three white foxes. A man on the left, and woman on the right, and a little boy in the center in front of the other two. Nick was sure that the man and the woman were Howard and Marie, but they looked young, happy, and not like half rotted corpses. The child, however, couldn't be identified by Nick. He assumed that it was the couple's son, though.

Nick was dumbfounded. The idea that these rotten, evil, motherfuckers were once normal people was a hard concept to grasp, but, then again, Judy had been the same way.

As he stared at the portrait, it suddenly fell off the wall and broke as it hit the ground, making a shatter that echoed through the halls.

"I heeeaaaar yooou!" Sung Howard. Nick didn't know where he was, but he knew that Howard was still on the hunt for him. He turned around and darted in the opposite direction that Howard's voice had come from.

Nick eventually slowed down and realized that he needed to be more rational to avoid running in circles again. He reached the end of the hall, with the hall continuing down left and right. He took note of the flower pot on the small table at the end of the hall, and remembered that he kept turning left at the flower pot, so he turned right.

After running to the end of that hall, he took a left, a right, and another left until he reached a hall with a door at the end of it, no more halls to continue down.

Nick opened the old, creaky, wooden door at the end of the hall slowly. He entered and closed the door behind him. The room was large, and had body bags hanging upside down along the walls of the room. Even though this was sickening enough on its own, the smell had surprisingly not gotten worse. Maybe Nick was just getting used to it at that point.

At the other end of the room was a door, as Nick ran to it, he realized that it has not only locked, but had a very strange keyhole on the knob. The hole was in the shape of what looked like a bird. Nick had never seen a lock like that before.

Nick held his nose, pacing around the room, trying to figure out what he could do to get the door open. He was about to try to figure out if the body bags had anything to do with it before the first door was kicked down, and in came Howard wielding a rusty axe.

"What's the matter, son? Don't wanna have some special bonding time?" Howard laughed through gritted teeth.


	4. Chapter 4 - The Fight

**Chapter 4 - The Fight**

Nick stood against the locked door as Howard slowly trudged towards him. He knew that he was in danger and that he had to get out of there. Nick ran towards Howard and ducked under his arm as Howard threw and missed a punch. He ran for the door that he came in through as Howard spun around, chasing after him. As Nick got to the door and desperately pulled at it, he realized it was locked as well. He was stuck in this room with psychopathic Howard.

Howard caught up to the panicking Nick and caught him in a headlock. He dragged Nick over to one of the walls, picked him up, and threw him at a collection of hanging body bags. As Nick's body hit those bags, he could feel the bones and mush of the meat inside the bags. Nick hit the floor with a thud, and as he looked up he could see Howard inching towards him. Nick got up on all fours and scampered away, eventually getting onto his feet and running across the room. He had no idea what to do. This arctic fox was taller, and probably stronger than he was. Howard suddenly burst into a sprint, going full speed at Nick. He picked up Nick and held him by the throat against a body bag using only one arm. As Nick was held up, he could feel something sharp jabbing him in the back. Something sharp was in that bag. Nick cocked his leg back, aimed for Howard's face, and hit his target. Howard howled in pain. Dropping Nick, he stepped back and held a paw to his eye.

"You sonovabitch! You're gonna fuckin' pay for that!" Howard screamed, clenching his teeth.

Nick ran to Howard and threw his body against him, knocking Howard over and giving Nick enough time to find whatever was in that bag. He ran back to the bag, tore it off of its rope constraints on the ceiling, opened it, and rifled through it.

"Haha, lookin' for something in that bag?" Howard laughed as he walked back over to Nick. He was taking his sweet, slow time. He must've felt confident in this little fight of his.

In his last-second panic before Howard got to him, Nick pulled out a pointy bone with a decently sharp edge.

"This'll do" Nick said to himself, before he got up and spun around with his arm out, slicing Howard's chest.

"Oww, mother fucker, that fuckin' hurt!" Howard growled. His claws came out and he lunged at Nick. Nick dodged out of the way and Howard hit the wall, falling to the floor. Nick spun back around to face Howard before jumping on him and impaling his back with the pointy bone. Howard howled once more before getting up, throwing Nick off of his back. He turned to Nick who was now laying on the floor and stepped on his chest.

"Listen here, boy, this is my house..." Howard said quietly before his voice rose to a scream "And in my house, we follow my rules! And my rules say... No uninvited guests!"

Howard then clenched his fist and slammed it down onto Nick's left arm, completely shattering both the bones in his forearm.

Nick couldn't respond to his arm being destroyed, his adrenaline was pumping and he was in pure shock. Howard grabbed Nick by the foot and started dragging him towards the door that they entered through. Nick snapped out of his trance and grabbed the bone with his right arm, his weak one, and he launched forward, jabbing Howard in the paw. Howard let go of Nick, and as Nick jumped up to his feet, he could see the pure anger in Howard's eyes. If Howard could hurt Nick with his looks, then Nick would already be dead.

Nick jumped at and shoved the bone into Howard's neck. Blood started leaking out, but when Nick pulled the bone out of Howard's neck, the blood was gushing out.

Howard clasped at his neck, trying to stop the steady flow of blood that was escaping him, but it was no use. Howard fell to his knees, and then fell to the ground.

Nick stood over the dead monster triumphantly. He looked like a hero with the blood glistening on his fur and the look of death in his eyes.

"Fuck you" was all Nick managed to mutter before the adrenaline stopped and the pain of his shattered forearm came in full force. The pain was overwhelming, sending Nick stepping backwards until he hit one of the body bags. He clenched his upper arm, tears streaming down his face. The blood, the bones, the dead bodies, and the broken arm had him vomiting all over the floor in front of him. This was way too much for him.

As Nick sat in his puddle of vomit waiting for the pain to start residing, he thought about what the fuck he was doing here.

It's Judy, yes, Judy Hopps. His best friend, crime fighting partner, and one of the only people to really understand him and the background he's come from.

Was it worth it though? She was insane and looked like a decomposing corpse. He didn't know if she could even be saved at this point.

Eventually the pain in the arm turned to nauseating numbness, and Nick got up and walked over to Howard. He noticed the shine of a key in his pocket. It was bird shaped.

Nick picked up the key with his unbroken arm and jogged to the locked door. The key fit perfectly, and in a short matter of time the door to a long, wooden staircase was open.


	5. Chapter 5 - The Guest House

**Chapter 5 - The Guest House**

As Nick unlocked the doors and ascended the stairs, his senses were going crazy. His head was swirling, just walking upright turned into a struggle against his own body. It was screaming for him to just lie down and rest. Stumbling forward, driven by pure adrenaline, he tried to focus. He still couldn't process what had just happened, and what was going on. All he knew was that he had just killed a monster.

The stairs creaked as he reached the top and entered another hall. At the left end of the hallway was a door covered in some disgusting, black goo. It almost looked like boiled cola. At the right end of the hallway was a small wooden door that Nick couldn't fit through without crouching down. Nick got to the end of the hall and grabbed the tiny door by the doorknob, twisting it and opening it. On the other side of the door was what looked like a main hall with a huge wooden double-door on one end and a table on the other. There were 3 other doors in the room as well. Nick squeezed through the small door and trotted over to the table where a few things laid. A coil of rope, a walkie-talkie, a shock collar, and an M1911 handgun. Nick picked up the gun and shoved it in his right pocket. It had no bullets but it could be useful for later if he were to find some. Nick also took the coil of rope and stuffed that into his left pocket. As he turned around to go check out the door, an ear piercing static sound came from behind him. Nick spun around back to the table with his only useable fist out, ready to fight, only to see that the static was coming from the walkie-talkie.

"H-hello? Anyone there?" A voice coming from the walkie-talkie cautiously asked.

Nick grabbed at the walkie-talkie and held down the button, gasping into it desperately. "Hello! Hello!? Who's this - who's here?" Nick took his finger off of the button to give the mammal on the other end a chance to respond

"Wuh-hoh, hold on there!" The voice from the other end laughed. "Hey... Good to see someone in the lunatic convention is alive."

This made Nick pause for a second. His life was in danger and the voice on the other walkie-talkie was laughing about it. "Name's Sebastian... Yours?" The voice inquired.

"Um... I'm Nick... Look, I don't know you or if you have any idea of what's going on, but you need to get me the fuck out of here!"

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry, I'm here to help!... Look around, see the front door?"

Nick turned to the front door. It was a set of large, wooden double doors with carvings of what looked like cogs in them. Nick looked back down to the walkie-talkie and held down the button on the side.

"Yeah, yeah, what about it?"

"Well, those gear carvings in the door are where three different sized gears are supposed to go. I already have two of them for you, they should be in the grandfather clock in the room you're in... As for the last one, I'm sorry, but you're going to need to find it on your own..." The voice from the walkie-talkie almost sounded sad for Nick, but this wasn't going to discourage him. He looked around until he saw a large grandfather clock against the left wall. He hadn't yet noticed it with his head spinning. He walked over and opened the clock. Inside were two gears tied up to the metal bar that the pendulum would normally go on.

Nick held up the walkie-talkie again. "Alright, I see the two gears. Any ideas of where the third might be?"

As Nick took his finger off the button, a sigh could be heard over the walkie-talkie. "No, I have no idea. All I know is that it's somewhere in the house. I haven't seen my folks leave the house with any of the gears since they were taken off the door, so it has to be in there."

This statement took Nick back a bit. "Your folks? What the hell do you mean by 'My folks'?"

After Nick took his finger off the button again, there was a slight pause.

"Yep, those are my parents... Currently figuring out a way to try to save them from whatever is going on with em'..."

It was Nick's turn to take a pause as he had realized what he'd done. "I'm sorry... Your, uh, your dad is, well, dead."

"Heh, no, he's not." Sebastian replied with a slight chuckle.

"Look, Sebastian, I'm sorry... I-I stabbed him in the back of the neck, I saw the blood leave his body." Nick said, leaning against the wall to steady himself.

"It may seem like he's dead, but trust me," Sebastian giggled. "He isn't. These aren't normal mammals, there's something messed up about them... Go find that last cog and meet me outside. We'll discuss a bit more then."

"What? No! You gotta tell me more! I don't know what the hell is going on, and you have my answers right now!" Nick said angrily, to no reply. "... Hey, you still there?"

After another period of silence without a reply, Nick audibly cursed out loud.

"F-uck! Son of a - fuck!" Nick punched the wall behind him with his non-broken arm. He looked around the room deciding where to head off to next, before settling on a rotted-looking wooden door in the corner of the main hall.

Nick twisted the knob and the door swung open, banging on the wall next to it. Behind it was a short hallway with 6 other doors, 3 on the left and 3 on the right, along with a dresser at the very end of the hall. Nick checked each door, with each revealing a small room that had a bed, a small dresser, and an even smaller table. As Nick got to inspecting the third room on the left of the hall, he opened the drawer and saw a plain, white piece of paper. He picked up the paper, and on the other side was a photograph of one of the gear keys. Yet it was so zoomed in, Nick could barely make out what the surroundings of the key were. Despite this, Nick could still spot what looked like a yellow book on the right side of the gear. Nick mentally noted the yellow book. After searching the last 3 of the 6 rooms, only to find nothing, Nick finally went to the large dresser at the end of the hall. Inside, he found a shoebox with old, worn-out, yet nice looking dress shoes inside. There was also a knife handle that was missing its blade. Nick pocketed it just in case he were to find the blade. There was a second photograph, this one of a grey, naked bunny in a cage. The bunny was laying on a bed in the cage, facing away from the camera, with whoever was holding the camera having one arm on one of the cage bars. Nick took the photo as well, as it could be helpful for tracking down a certain missing bunny. The last item in the drawer was a piece of metal shaped like a cat. It reminded Nick of Howard's snake key from the basement, so he took it, expecting another ridiculously shaped lock somewhere in the house.

Nick left the hall, entered the main hall, and eyed between the two last doors for him to explore. He picked the door closest to him and went right to it. On the other side of that door was what looked like a lounge. It had a three step staircase going down to a landing, with a couch, a mini fridge, an old TV and a fuzzy carpeted floor. There was also a creepy statue of a caribou, but he couldn't tell if it was a just a fake statue, or an actual caribou body, like what Nick would find in a museum. Going with what he knew about this family by now, they probably just found and killed a caribou themselves. Nick walked over to the couch and flopped onto it. He let out a tired yawn and he shifted to now lay on any sore spots of his body. He rested his head on the armrest and laid across the length of the couch, with his eyes half closed, reflecting on what he's gone through so far. His best friend gone savage, literally insane people trying to kidnap and murder him. He thought he'd seen it all, until he started to feel something wet underneath him.

He sat up and hopped up off the couch to see that it was oozing black liquid. He had no idea what the liquid was, but it began to smell quite vile, like vomit and blood mixed together. Nick then felt a crawling sensation on his back, and as he reached back to scratch it he got a sear of pain in his hand. He pulled his hand away from his back only to find a large black beetle-looking bug hanging from his hand, with its mouth clamped down in between his thumb and his pointer finger. Nick could'nt rip off the bug with his broken arm, so he ran to the end of the room and slammed his hand against the door. He looked at it again and now saw the bug writhing and wiggling, it was clearly in pain but was still hanging on. Nick clenched his fist, beginning to crush the bug, and then punched the wall once more. As Nick released his fist, the bug fell to the ground. He looked at his hand and saw a ton of white dots where the bug was biting. It had probably lost its teeth, which were now lodged and stuck in his hand. He couldn't do anything about this without a second hand, so he just clenched his fist once more and dealt with the pain. As he leaned against the wall to gather his senses after all of that, he started to feel the same searing pain all down his back. He yelped, lept into the air, and then fell on his back, using his legs to push him back and forth across the carpet trying to scrape his back. After a minute of carpet back scratching, he used his good arm to push him back up to his knees. He looked back at the carpet to get a quick glance of all the bugs from his back quickly crawling back over to the couch, only to be absorbed by the black liquid that continued to leak from it. He looked over his shoulder at his back, and while he could barely see it, he could tell there probably weren't any bugs left.

"Stupid, fucking, piece of shit, fuck-" Nick needed to let out his anger. He didn't remember where, but he once read that cursing can alleviate pain. Now he knew it worked. Once Nick finally got his composure back, he started to look around the room again. The caribou statue was still there, looking creepy as ever. He also saw the fridge and the TV. The couch looked completely tar black at this point, and the liquid pouring from it was beginning to flood onto the floor. He went over to the TV and tried to turn it on but it didn't work. He inspected the back of the TV and saw that it was still plugged in. Another try, and, no, the TV wasn't going to work. He then moved on to the mini fridge. He opened it, and despite expecting severed heads, Nick was only greeted by the things you'd normally find in a fridge. Carton of milk, juice, bread, all looked normal until he found a note. It was thumbtacked to the back of the fridge. Nick grabbed the note and held it up to the light, reading it.

"Howard.

The guests keep trying to escape. I've hidden all of the cogs so they can't get out. If you need to leave, here are the locations:

1) Under the cushions of the couch in the lounge.

2) Under the dresser in the guest hall.

3) In one of the cabinets in the kitchen. I don't remember which one. Find it yourself."

It wasn't signed.

"Guess Howard won't be needing this anymore," Nick said under his breath, as he pocketed the note and turned back around to the couch. "and I sure as hell hope it isn't under there..."

Nick went over to the couch, stepping into the black liquid, it was stickier than it was before. He carefully grabbed and threw the cushions away, trying to get as little of the liquid on him as possible. He skid his hand across the non-cushioned couch but couldn't feel anything. He took his hand out, wiped it on the carpet. He was about to leave the room when he heard a crackling sound. He looked back to see that the liquid on the couch and the floor was hardening, turning into the goo that he saw on the door before he got into the main hall. He looked down and saw that the liquid left on his hand had been turning to goo as well. Nick couldn't do anything about it, but it crippled him more than he already was with the broken arm. He left the room, went back to the bedroom hall, and headed straight for the dresser at the end. He kneeled down and looked under the dresser. Nothing.

"Great, this just couldn't have been easy, could it?" Nick mumbled. He headed back out into the main hall and eyed the door that he'd yet to go through. He grabbed the doorknob and slowly turned it, half expecting something to be on the other side. The ticklish feeling in his stomach reminded him of his fear. On the other side of the door was a kitchen, but it was mostly covered in that disgusting black hardened goo. The kitchen didn't look anything like a house kitchen, more like a restaurant kitchen. There were rows of metal counters to walk between, and even more metal counters up against the back walls. Nick walked around the perimeter of the kitchen, trying his best not to step in the black goo. It didn't seem to be hurting him, and since it was already hardened it wasn't sticking to him, but he didn't want to take any chances with mysterious hardening black liquids that seemed to also house biting beatles. As Nick got to the back of the kitchen he noticed a yellow cookbook. He looked around the area but didn't see any gears. It wasn't under or behind the book, nor was it in any of the cabinets around the area. He opened the book and frantically flipped through the heavy, thick pages until he got to a page that had a gear taped to it.

"Oh sweet hell! Yes, yes!" Nick cried out happily. He ripped off the tape, grabbed the gear, and ran back to the main hall. This time he ignored all of the black goo all over the floor. He eventually got into the main hall and rushed over to the grandfather clock. Nick hung the gear from his belt as he opened the clock, grabbing at the 2 tied up gears with his only useable hand. He got his claws out and sliced at the rope holding them to the metal bar. The gears fell and hit the bottom of the clock with a bang, the metal bar extracted upwards into the clock and then came back down, this time carrying a pendulum. The clock went off, the pendulum swinging back and forth, making the loudest DING, DING, DING that Nick had ever heard.

"Hey, what's all the clatter down there?" called Marie. Nick realized he wasn't alone, but he had no idea how long she'd been in the house.

Nick grabbed at the two gears, frantically trying to untangle them from the rope with only one hand. As Nick got them untangled and scooped them up, Marie came out from the lounge door. She was standing in between the front door and him. He had no idea when she got in there, considering the only way in there was from the main hall.

"It's you, you little shit!" Marie screeched at Nick.

Before Nick could respond or even realized what was going on, Marie charged at him with full speed. She slammed into him, sending him flying at least 5 feet backwards, sprawled on the ground on his back. Nick scrambled to get back up, but Marie stomped up to him before he could get to his feet. She stomped down on his stomach. Paralyzing pain sent him back to the floor. She lifted her foot above his head and slammed down. All he saw was black.


	6. Chapter 6 - The Cabin

**Chapter 6 - The Cabin**

Nick woke with a start. He looked up to a ceiling that was pretty close to his face, before shifting his attention to the single-sized bed he was laying on. He got up cautiously, taking in the scene. He was in a log cabin. It was quite spacious with old, dark wood and a few windows, allowing a little bit of light to stream in. There were some old, torn couches, a fridge, and a busted tube TV. He looked to the door of the cabin and snuck over to it, placing his paw gently on the handle. He took a slight pause, readying himself to make a run for it until the door swung open in his direction. In came a white fox who looked to be about his age, but was slightly taller. He wore a black sweatshirt and black sweatpants, looking like any generic highschool emo kid Nick had ever seen.

The fox smiled down at Nick. "Ah, you're finally awake."

Nick gained his composure and held his fists in a fighting stance, ready to take down whoever this was. "Move away from the damn door..." Nick said, slowly backing away from the fox.

The fox just laughed and gave Nick a quizzical look, keeping the same smile. "Oooh you poor thing." The fox shook his head. "Don'cha worry yourself, I'm not here to hurt you. In fact..." the fox eyed down at Nick's arm.

Nick looked at his arm. It took him a couple of seconds, but then it hit him. It wasn't broken anymore. He grabbed his arm, staring at it in awe. "What the fuck... how…?" Nick ran his hand up and down the newly repaired arm, trying to piece together how this could've happened. The white fox just giggled as he walked past Nick, moving towards the refrigerator. Nick looked up and turned to the fox, who was now rifling through the fridge. "How long have I been out?"

"Oh, about a day, maybe two at the most. That was a pretty bad stomping you took to the face, but it should be all healed up now," the fox said without turning around from the fridge.

Nick put his hand up to his left eye, and then his right eye. No pain, none whatsoever. It's like nothing had happened at all thus far. "How... Tell me how!" Nick demanded in a sudden burst of confused anger.

The fox finally turned back, holding a half-empty carton of milk and a syringe with glowing yellow liquid in it. "I dunno, just some stuff I found in my parents' lab. It was labeled 'First Aid Med', tried it on myself and it worked wonders," the fox said, chugging down a carton of milk.

"Holy shit... What's going on..." was all that Nick could mutter.

"Oh, and, by the way, here's more anti-venom." The fox said as he walked up to Nick and jabbed the syringe into his right shoulder before he could even react.

"Hey, what the fuck are you doing!?" Nick panicked, trying to pull away from the fox and the syringe.

"Oh, calm down!" The fox said, gripping Nick's arm tightly to ensure everything in the needle got into him. "Like I said, anti-venom, you're going to have to be taking this for a while unless you want to drop dead." The fox took the syringe out of Nick's shoulder and tossed in into the trashcan halfway across the cabin.

"Anti-venom? What the fuck do you mean, anti-venom?" Nick's voice was shaky.

The fox just shrugged as he walked over to the small futon couch at the end of the cabin. "When I was doing blood tests I found some venom in your blood. I dunno how you got it, but you're gonna need to be taking anti-venom for a while, at least until your body flushes all of the poison out."

"Fuck... Okay..." Nick said, slowly walking back to the bed to sit down.

"So, good news and bad news. Bad news is that I'm out of anti-venom." the fox said, as Nick looked up in surprise. "Good news... Ummm... I don't think there is any..." The fox quietly said, scratching his forehead.

Nick jumped to his feet. Glaring at the fox he yelled, "You can't be serious! I'm just gonna die, because YOU ran out of fucking anti-venom?"

"Ehhh, calm down, calm down." The fox giggled. "I know where we can find some, but we have to go down to my parents' lab." The fox looked to Nick. "And I'm NOT going down there alone again. If you want the anti-venom, you gotta come with me."

Nick sighed and lowered his head. "Parents' lab… Your parents… Those aren't the fucking freaks who kidnapped me and tried to kill me, are they?" He felt untrust of the white fox sitting across the room from him.

"Haha, yep! The one and on- or, uh, two and only!" The fox cheered.

Nick sighed and weighed his two options. Either he went to this 'lab' the fox spoke of and take the chance of dying, or just die from poison anyway…

"Ok, where's the lab?" Nick asked. When Nick looked up, the fox was in front of him, looking down at him with his paw extended for a handshake.

"Haha, that's the spirit! By the way, the name's Sebastian. Nice to finally meet you."


	7. Chapter 7 - The Lab

**Chapter 7 - The Lab**

After leaving the cabin, Nick and Sebastian trudged through the forest in the back of the family's property. The long walk made Nick realize that the cabin probably wasn't part of the property itself. As the two foxes walked in near total silence, a million thoughts were racing through Nick's head. That was, until Sebastian broke the silence.

"Sooooo, Nick, I, uh, forgot to ask, why're you here, anyways?"

"A friend of mine is here. I came here to save her, but now I'm not even sure if that's possible anymore," Nick said in a monotone voice.

"It's the rabbit, I'm guessing?" Sebastian mused.

"Mhm, that's her!" Nick confirmed in a matter-of-fact tone. "You've seen her around?"

"Yeah, she's the newest 'member of the family'," Sebastian said, doing air quotes.

"You… Uh, you think there's any chance of saving her?" Nick nervously asked.

"Well, I've never actually been able to save anyone before. But, with you here?" Sebastian said, putting his arm around Nick's shoulders "Maybe, just maybe, we'll be able to make that dream become a reality." Sebastian finished with a smile.

Nick thought that Sebastian seemed a bit too hopeful for his own good. "Then, do you finally want to fill me in on what's going on? You seem to know about what's up."

Sebastian's smile dropped. "I really wish I knew what was going on. I've honestly told you basically all I know so far."

Nick didn't believe any of that, but he decided to not press the question any further.

"Oh, and, hey, I noticed that you had a gun on you when I, y'know, saved your life," Sebastian commented with a smirk "Got any bullets for it?"

"No, the gun came without ammo," Nick coldly answered

"Ah, and I'm guessing you didn't _find_ any ammo for it?" Sebastian asked sarcastically.

This got a chuckle out of Nick. "Nope, didn't find any," he replied, managing to calm down a bit.

Sebastian reached into his sweatshirt pocket and pulled out a few mags of ammo for the pistol. "I have the same gun," he said, pulling out his own pistol, before putting it back away in his pocket. He dropped the mags into Nick's open paw.

"Thanks. I just, well, really hope it doesn't come to this…" Nick said, feeling his anxious, awkward feeling returning.

"Me neither," Sebastian replied-

The two fell into silence once again.

Eventually, Nick asked, "Um, how far away is this lab, exactly?"

"It's right there." Sebastian cleared through some bushes and pointed at a wooden shack no bigger than an outhouse. When he saw the confusion on Nick's face, he chuckled. "Don't worry, that's not it."

Sebastian walked over to the tiny shack and opened the door. All that was inside the shack was a hatch on the ground. Sebastian opened it, revealing a wooden ladder that descended far into an unknown darkness.

"This couldn't have been easy, could it?" Nick said in disbelief. He couldn't fathom why someone would dig out an underground lab on their property, unless that had something to hide…

Sebastian sighed in response. "Nope, no it couldn't have been… Well, down we go!" He took his first step onto the ladder, followed by a few more steps downwards, before looking back up. "Hey, buddy, you comin' or not?"

"Y-y-yeah" Nick snapped out of his cloud of thought as he took a step onto the ladder, following after Sebastian.

For at least ten minutes, the two foxes continued to climb down the seemingly endless ladder. Nick kept descending until he heard a yelp, followed by a yell. He looked below him to see his fox companion falling down the hole. After a second, there was a thud.

"Sebastian!" Nick called out, as he grabbed the sides of the ladder and slid his way down. He landed in water. Looking down, he saw that the floor was flooded. The walls of the room were made of stone, with lanterns hanging from hooks lodged into the walls. Right next to his feet was Sebastian, laying on his back. He eyes were open in shock, staring straight upwards.

"Sebastian, you alright?" Nick asked, as he held a paw out to the fox on the ground.

"Yep, just in a lot of pain" Sebastian weakly replied breathless. He managed to take a hold of Nick's paw. With the help of the fellow fox, he scrambled to his feet and steadied himself.

"You okay? You good to keep going?" Nick calmly asked. Looking over at Sebastian, Nick doubted he was in any condition to keep on going at the moment.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm good" Sebastian replied, catching his breath again. "L-Let's go"

Nick simply replied with a concerned nod. He grabbed a lantern off of one of the wall's hooks and held it out in front of him. The only way to keep going was down the darkness in front of them. He held on to Sebastian's shoulder as they made their way down the catacomb.

After another long while of walking, they reached a wooden door. As they came closer they saw it stood slightly open. The door creaked as Nick slowly pushed it open.

As the foxes went through the door, they were greeted by a large room made of stone. It was filled with tables, chairs, vials, papers, whiteboards, pinboards, cabinets, and other various containers and glasses scattered across each table. The room was illuminated by more lanterns hanging from the walls.

"Here it is" Sebastian said, holding his left arm out. "The lab."

Nick wandered off, looking at everything that the lab had to offer. "Okay, what are we looking for here?"

"The same, glowy yellow stuff that I injected you with earlier. That's the anti-venom" Sebastian replied as he tried to straighten his back out. "Oh, and also more of that First Aid Med stuff, I could use that right now…"

"Got it." Nick affirmed as he went from cabinet to cabinet, searching for what he needed. He continued his search until the two heard a loud splat come from outside the room. Both foxes stopped dead and turned to the door.

"You hear that?" Nick asked quietly

"Sh-sh-sh-sh-sh-sh-sh" Sebastian hushed Nick, continuing to just stare at the door.

Suddenly, from out of the hallway's darkness emerged a disfigured bunny. It was Judy. She stumbled into the room and stood there, staring back and forth between the two foxes. One of them by the entrance of the room, the other over in the corner.

"Judy…" Nick barely whispered. He took a step forward. At the same moment, Judy lashed out. She jump forward and grabbed Sebastian by the neck.

"Judy! Put him down! Please!" Nick begged. He hoped some remnant of the girl he once knew was still there.

She responded by throwing Sebastian across the room. He crashed into a wooden rack stocked with glass bottles. All of it came crashing down around him, with the fox left unmoving on the floor. Judy turned to Nick and snarled, now inching towards him.

"S-sweety, please don't do anything you're gonna regret, alright?" Nick stumbled over his own words.

Judy broke out into a dash towards Nick. A few feet away from him, she lunged at him. In pure instinct, Nick held his fist out and spun around. He clocked her in the side of the head. The impact sent her down to the ground, landing right beside him. He took a step back, looking at what he had just done. On one hand, he knew he had to. On the other hand, this was still Judy…

His train of thought was brought to an abrupt end. Gunshots rang from behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see Sebastian standing up, gun in paw. He then looked back to Judy. There was a bullet lodged in her forehead. For a terrible moment, the world stopped for Nick. Then Judy moved her arm. Nick stumbled backwards in horror. Judy somehow pulled herself to her feet. She dragged herself towards Nick. More gunshots. Sebastian's bullets slammed into her head. They sent her back to the ground. Nick stared down at the now motionless bunny. His head felt empty, suddenly devoid of any emotion.

Nick only snapped out of this when he heard screams from behind. He spun around and saw Howard holding up Sebastian by the head. Howard held Sebastian up, and chucked him at the ground. His head hit the stone and cracked open, splattering blood all over the floor.

"I **knew** it! I **knew** you'd be more trouble than you'd be worth!" Howard yelled, now staring at Nick.

Nick fumbled for the gun in his pockets. Without hesitation he emptied an entire magazine right into Howard. Howard merely flinched at the bullets penetrating him.

"That weak bunny may have been taken down with a gun, but you really think it'll be that easy with me? I'm stronger now!" Howard laughed maniacally.

Howard lunged forward. Nick jumped, dodging him by mere centimeters. He hit the ground and rolled forward. A split-second later he bolted for the other side of the room. He grabbed a random beaker with green, sizzling liquid in it, and splashed it at Howard. The fox grabbed his eyes and howled in pain. Nick scanned the table, but there was no more of the liquid.

"That's it, enough playing around!" Howard roared, face red with rage. As Howard inched towards him, Nick frantically grabbed at, and chucked empty beakers at Howard, each hit leaving him completely unfazed. By the time that he had run out of glass to throw, Howard has him trapped in the corner. There, he grabbed Nick by the neck and squeezed, beginning to crush the bones in his neck. He felt his throat flooding with blood, and his consciousness slipping. Nick struggled until the last moment, but eventually went limp. Howard dropped the dead fox onto the ground.

"Sometimes, these fuckers just can't have the happy ending that they want" he muttered, as he turned around and left the lab.


End file.
